Hello, friends and fans!
Welcome to another “Peek At My Week” – April 8, 2024! Here are some things that happened this past week!
News About Writing & Publishing: This Is The Current State Of Things
- I’m Not Writing (fiction) Right Now – as soon as it’s appropriate, I will be sure to let you know why – in the meantime, I beg your indulgence, and your patience! I apologize for not having terribly much “news” to share with you lately, but unfortunately that’s just how things are right now, and will probably remain so for a while.
- What Readers Say: I know I can’t please everybody (so I’m not trying to!). That said, it really pleases me when I see that I’ve managed to do it anyway! If there’s nothing new below, just pop along here to have a look at all the reader’s comments I’ve collected so far.
Bibliography – A listing of all my books so far:
You can find them at and my shop page on .
Other Stuff
Last week, I posted four articles on my old activist blog, “Sour Grapes: The Fruit of Ignorance“:
- Too Much Money, Too Little Sense
- Lock Up Your Schools, The Transgenders Are Coming!
- Breaking Into The Echo Chamber
- South Africa’s Right Wing Has No Originality
During last week, I also put out my monthly newsletter for April, “Christina Engela’s Monthly Newsletter: #87 April 2024“.
I haven’t put out any new videos since last week either, as I still need to get in front of the camera again and do some shooting. Aside from the tech, writing and book-related videos I’ve been doing, I’m also looking at doing a new series that I’ll get into with you another time!
“He Has Strange Socks”
So this went down a few days ago in the WhatsApp group for my neighborhood security company/watch. Someone got a little hysterical because some dude was walking down their street acting suspiciously, and called for the security company to send a patrol vehicle. The last comment was something totally unexpected and left me in stitches!
Unfortunately, I have no idea what the socks in question looked like, or what was so “strange” about them! But they must’ve been something extra special for someone to call security on them!
SA’s Right Wing Has No Originality
Last I heard, the US singer Taylor Swift really had nothing to do with South Africa, other than some of her music making its way out here, but I just noticed this being shared from Saturday’s local Afrikaner nationalist newspaper, “Die Burger”.
Apparently this poor singer/entertainer, who does a lot of charity work, is – according to those beating this drum, “a satanic singer” and “from the Devil” and they mischaracterize her in one of their newspaper posters by portraying her as some sort of devil or demonic entity surrounded by “satanic” worshipers, complete with a red mood light.
What do they base this slander on? Fact? Fiction? Do they even know? Do they even care that they’re just jumping on the band-wagon to be another cheapskate bully – all for the sake of cheap populist sensationalism?
Whether it’s perpetuating the 1980’s “Satanic Panic”, or the “culture war”, or Q’Anon “talking points” practically verbatim, the Afrikaans right wing always seems to take their cues from the backwater bottom-feeders in the illiterate American religious right. Why is that? Are they really that connected, are they really so incapable of being original – or are they really just that gullible?
What is it with Afrikaners these days? Is it something in the melktert? 🤔 Read more.
As always, I’ll keep you posted about any new developments, so until then, I wish you all a pleasant week!